If you somehow escaped your Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Vine or YouTube being flooded with images of friends trying to achieve an alluring snapshot of self-representation, then you can’t have missed all those politicians and celebrities getting in on the act.

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And nothing brings home how homogeneous it is like scrolling through selfie after selfie on a screen, to the comi-tragic accompaniment of 1940s US crooner Arthur Godfrey singing&colon; “I’m a lonely little petunia in an onion patch.”

Mesmerising and horrifying in equal measure, this is part of an exhibition called Monoculture by artist Tamsyn Challenger, staged at Summerhall, one of this year’s venues at the UK’s annual Edinburgh Art Festival.

Monoculture uses agriculture as a metaphor&colon; it is both a warning and a contributing factor. It asks&colon; what happens to society when our cultural and physical inputs are monoculture, using the selfie and oil seed rape as examples.

Get your close-up

Grow your own art (Image&colon; Tamsyn Challenger)

A raised bed of oil seed rape grown on site sprawls opposite some “skins” – white bodysuits bearing uniform faces. Nearby, a small room at the bottom of one of the venue’s aged stairwells houses the “photo booth”, a desk with the words “Lift me up” painted on top. It turns out to house primping implements – makeup, hairbrush, wet wipes and a mirror – ready to make you perfect for your selfie.

Most chilling is the Monoculture Playground, a beautiful, gruesome collection of medieval torture equipment, in white and Facebook blue. The intention is clear&colon; the stocks, emblazoned with “Take your selfie here” have an enlarged arm hole on one side to give room to reach through to snap their shot. The leg stocks, which sport the word “Like”, evoke a sense of suffocation.

The pièce de résistance, however, is Challenger’s new take on that horrific instrument of execution, the breaking (or Catherine) wheel.

For Monoculture, the wheel is exhibited horizontally at around waist height, with an overt nod to Twitter&colon; “Please love me/Do not exceed 140 characters”. The message is clear&colon; the quest for approval in a social media world where we have gamefied our aesthetic and verbal expressions of personality is a dangerous trap.

And there is some early evidence to back this up, with research showing that social media use can be a powerful influence on our psychology.

It is perhaps no surprise that Challenger includes video clips of a recent interview with Noam Chomsky, about his 1988 book Manufacturing Consent, on the effect of the media on societal attitudes and decision making.

Two other works at the festival echo Monoculture’s message. Donna Leishman’s Front at New Media Scotland is the social media retelling of the Greek myth of Daphne, with the wide-eyed protagonist posting selfies on her Front page – which looks rather uncannily like Facebook – while an amorous youth named PH chases her online. In the desperate voice of an unloved teen, Daphne is both vicious and vulnerable – but ultimately a victim. This work, like Monoculture, also reflects the issues of privacy and gender that are woven into our digital intercourse.

Seed of an idea (Image&colon; Stuart Armitt/Edinburgh Art Festival)

From the other direction, Amar Kanwar’s work – exhibited as part of Where Do I End and You Begin – tells the story of the state of Odisha in India, a hotbed of unrest over mining and agriculture developments that have seen multinationals such as BP and Monsanto taking an active interest in the area and the rise of monoculture.

Kanwar’s 272 Varieties Of Indigenous Organic Rice Seeds, housed in a sanctum at the Old Royal High School, in Edinburgh, is an artistic seed bank paying homage to the decades of selective breeding that has produced a wide range of crops that flourish in the rich diversity of soils in the region. Exhibited with books and videos detailing heartrending social injustice and loss of knowledge, the works bring home the social and ecological effects of intensive, single-crop farming.

When Challenger asks&colon; “What will happen to our minds and bodies if what we input has no variety?”, Kanwar’s work suggests the outlook may not be rosy.

So next time you update your Facebook status, remember you are part of a global social ecosystem – and your input helps decide whether it becomes a monoculture.

Tamsyn Challenger&colon; Monoculture can be seen at the Edinburgh Art Festival, UK, until 26 September